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How to scale Hearthstone's Blackrock Mountain: initial tips, tricks, and strategies

Damian Marley 'aint got nothing on Hearthstone

How to scale Hearthstone's Blackrock Mountain: initial tips, tricks, and strategies

With Blackrock Mountain being the second solo dungeon for Hearthstone, we knew more about what to expect this time.

So instead of rushing out a strategy guide to what was likely to be quite an easy adventure, we've sat on our thoughts for a few more days. This way we can assess what's on offer from a more sober perspective.

First impressions are that while Blizzard learned some lessons from Naxxramas, Blackrock is still lacking in certain areas.

In particular, there's been no improvement in the AI on offer. This is still very much an expansion you play through to get the cards. And possibly for the satisfaction of beating it on the ludicrous heroic difficulty.

How to get the cards

Like Naxxramas, each section of Blackrock contains three bosses and two class challenges.

The first encounter is against the Grim Guzzler. He uses his free hero power every turn to summon a random minion both for himself and, helpfully, for you. He's easy to beat in the normal mode just by filling your deck with high-cost summons.

On heroic mode you can exploit a bug in his AI. If you've got Kel'Thuzad, put him in a deck along with a big, stable taunt minion like a Sunwalker or Lord of the Arena. After two minions, fill the rest up with spells. Your first two minions will come out in the first two turns and the Guzzler won't attack, knowing that doing so will just see the taunter getting re-summoned.

Shamans work best with this since they can keep summoning minions with the hero power, and fill their deck with direct damage, healing and replacement spells. But Mages can work too, with a bit of luck.

The second match is in the Dark Iron Arena against a deck full of legendary minions. Fortunately, although all the cards are powerful they don't synergise well together, so it's not too difficult to get through.

On both difficulties, control decks that can do board wipes and steal minion control are the way to go. Freeze mages and mind-control Priests will see you right. Plus don't forget Faceless Manipulator to copy those tasty legendaries.

Emperor Thaurissan is the only deck that offers significant challenge. He starts with a minion that must stay alive otherwise he gets an instant win. However, his deck is full of area damage spells like Unstable Ghoul and Abomination to make that difficult.

An aggressive Priest deck is the solution. You can use heals to keep his precious wife alive, while smashing at his face with everything you've got.

The class challenges are a piffle, with both decks playing themselves. There's literally no strategy at all to the Mage one, since you're give a deck consisting entirely of Unstable Portal, which summons random minions!

What to do with them

So now you've earned your loot, you'll be super keen to put them in your decks.

The class cards for Priest, Hunter and Mage don't look particularly useful. Dragon's Breath and Resurrect are too situational. Quick Shot doesn't look much of a trade up from Arcane Shot.

Plus, it's debatable whether Blizzard was wise to give the over-used FaceHunter archetype more ammunition.

There was a lot of anticipation over the Rogue card gang up. And the appeal of using it to replicate powerful legendary minions is undeniable. But in reality, that isn't going to happen very often, as most games are just too short. It's more useful as a way to make the most out of powerful Battlecry effects.

What it could do in a mill deck combined with Antique Healbot is terrifying.

Grim Patron can fit into a lot of different deck types. While its most obvious synergy is with warrior decks and their plethora of self-damaging cards, it's surprisingly diverse. Mages can make it replicate with their fireball power. Paladins can buff it and lower the attack of enemy minions, both adding significant duplication potential. Priests can achieve a similar effect with Shrinkmeister.

For any other class, Bombers of various sorts, Wild Pyromancer and Crazed Alchemist will serve.

The wing reward, Emperor Thaurissan, is even more versatile. His ability to reduce the cost of other cards is useful in every single control deck and many mid-tempo decks too.

What we think

Although the difficulty curve hasn't improved, Blackrock feels a lot more entertaining to play than Naxxramas. There's a bit more narrative interplay between fights, and the bosses themselves are just more fun.

The best example of this is the Mage class challenge. Your deck consists of nothing but Unstable Portal, so you have no control over what you summon. This abandons any pretence of strategy, but it can be hugely amusing.

Paired with boss that has a custom one-liner for each legendary in its deck and you've got a fight that's worth replaying multiple times.

Perhaps the biggest change between the two dungeons, though, is only hinted at in this initial wing. Most of the cards introduced in Naxxramas haven't become staples in the meta. Only Sludge Belcher and Haunted Creeper get seen in multiple deck styles.

Blizzard seems to have planned Blackrock with more permanence in mind. In particular, the new Dragon deck style seems destined to stick around for some time to come. And while it's best suited to Paladins and Priests, those draconic cards can work with any class.

We've yet to see how much of this will come to pass. But, as ever, half the fun of Hearthstone is watching the meta to find out.

Matt Thrower
Matt Thrower
Matt is a freelance arranger of words concerning boardgames and video games. He's appeared on IGN, PC Gamer, Gamezebo, and others.